{"id":655,"date":"2016-08-09T18:46:13","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T18:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/?p=655"},"modified":"2016-08-09T22:48:30","modified_gmt":"2016-08-09T22:48:30","slug":"tstc-joins-area-school-districts-for-early-college-high-school-initiatives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/?p=655","title":{"rendered":"TSTC Joins Area School Districts for Early College High School Initiatives"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(WACO) \u2013 Texas State Technical College in Waco will continue to partner with two area school districts and a public independent charter school this fall as part of early college high schools.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cSince the students are part of an early college high school, there is no charge to the student,\u201d said Sheryl Kattner-Allen, a manager in Dual Enrollment Operations at TSTC. \u201cThe school districts pick up all the costs. TSTC benefits students by helping them to complete their degrees and get placed in the workforce.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Texas has more than 150 early college high schools, according to the Texas Education Agency.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The TEA has given approval for the La Vega Independent School District to have an early college high school for the second year at La Vega High School. This partnership also includes McLennan Community College. La Vega students who apply for the program can choose which associate degree track to pursue at either of the colleges.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWe are really blessed at La Vega ISD in where we are and have access to colleges and opportunities for our students,\u201d said Elicia Krumnow, director of the early college high school at La Vega ISD. \u201cThe relationship with TSTC goes back a while through our Career and Technology Education programs.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The La Vega Early College High School had 50 freshmen who this academic year will be sophomores. For the upcoming academic year, it accepted 69 incoming freshmen.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThere is an application process and we have populations that we target based on the standards given by the state,\u201d said Krumnow. \u201cOur district is a Title I district and some of our students are economically disadvantaged. We also target students that are underrepresented at the college level. Black males are underrepresented along with minority students \u2013 minority females in particular. We also target students that are English-language learners or first-generation college goers.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">TSTC will start its third year with the Connally Independent School District for Connally Career Tech Early College High School for students to earn associate degrees and high school diplomas concurrently.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Connally Career Tech focuses on TSTC\u2019s technical careers for its students, said Principal Hermann Pereira. This year\u2019s early college high school will begin with 120 Connally students, five teachers, one counselor and one principal.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWe are recruiting students who have a passion for career and technology fields,\u201d Pereira said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">TSTC has its longest early college high school partnership with Rapoport Academy in Waco. Students take the Texas Success Initiative assessment between eighth and ninth grades and begin taking college-level courses at TSTC or MCC. This year, Rapoport Academy will have 160 high school students taking college-level classes at TSTC and MCC, Superintendent Alexis Neumann said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Neumann credited TSTC with being an innovator in forging early college high school connections.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe students get what they need and what they are interested in,\u201d Neumann said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For additional information on Texas\u2019 early college high schools, go to tea.texas.gov\/curriculum\/echs\/.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(WACO) \u2013 Texas State Technical College in Waco will continue to partner with two area school districts and a public independent charter school this fall as part of early college high schools. \u201cSince the students are part of an early college high school, there is no charge to the student,\u201d said Sheryl Kattner-Allen, a manager [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-waco"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=655"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":656,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655\/revisions\/656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}